The US Treasury faces a potential bill of “tens of billions of dollars” if President Trump’s tariff policies are deemed illegal, a scenario the Treasury Secretary himself has labeled “terrible.” This stark financial warning from Scott Bessent comes at the very moment Trump is proposing his most audacious tariff plan yet: a joint US-EU action to impose 100% duties on India and China.
Bessent’s comments, made in a recent television interview, highlight the massive domestic risk underpinning the administration’s aggressive trade posture. He admitted that should the Supreme Court rule against the president, the government would have to refund “about half the tariffs” already collected. The court is scheduled to hear the pivotal case in the first week of November.
Despite this precarious legal and financial situation, the White House is doubling down. Trump’s new proposal aims to pressure Russia to end the war in Ukraine by economically punishing its most significant trade partners. The plan was formally presented to European Union officials in Washington, with the US signaling it is “ready to go” but only with the EU’s full participation.
This strategy seeks to counter the growing alliance between Russian President Vladimir Putin and the leaders of India and China. The US has already acted unilaterally against India, imposing 50% tariffs over its purchases of Russian oil. Trump’s latest move seeks to build a powerful economic coalition to escalate that pressure, even as the potential cost of failure mounts back home.